Elon Musk Admits Tesla’s Full Self-Driving Won’t Work on Current Hardware

Featured & Cover Elon Musk Admits Tesla’s Full Self Driving Won’t Work on Current Hardware

After over a decade of repeatedly assuring customers that Tesla was on the brink of achieving full self-driving (FSD) and selling vehicles with costly computing hardware under the promise that they would appreciate in value once the feature became functional, CEO Elon Musk has now conceded that it is not possible with the existing hardware.

During Tesla’s most recent quarterly earnings call, Musk made the “absolutely painful and difficult” acknowledgment to investors.

“The truth is that we’re gonna have to upgrade people’s Hardware 3 [computers] for those who have bought Full Self Driving,” Musk admitted. “And that is the honest answer.”

Reflecting on the situation, he remarked, “I’m kind of glad that not that many people bought the FSD package”—a statement that stands in stark contrast to the years he spent urging customers to purchase it.

As noted by The Verge, Musk’s statement came as he interrupted Tesla’s Autopilot and AI chief, Ashok Elluswamy, effectively contradicting his own executive while Elluswamy attempted to reassure investors that Tesla had not abandoned HW3.

Elluswamy, however, managed the situation with composure, hinting that Tesla would be releasing a “baby” version of FSD while engineers continue to develop the latest self-driving feature for vehicles equipped with the newer Hardware 4 computers.

Previous Warnings

Musk’s admission follows earlier remarks made during a quarterly earnings call last year, where he appeared to acknowledge that HW3 might not be sufficient.

“There is some chance,” Musk said during Tesla’s Q3 2024 earnings call last October, “that HW3 does not achieve the safety level that allows for unsupervised FSD.”

“H4 has several times the capability of HW3,” he further explained. “It’s easier to get things to work on HW4 and it takes a lot of effort to squeeze that into HW3.”

Tesla first began offering “free” HW3 upgrades in 2018 to customers who had purchased the FSD software for their vehicles. During the most recent earnings call, as reported by Teslerati, Musk reaffirmed a similar commitment to upgrading FSD buyers to HW4. However, he did not provide a timeline for when these upgrades might take place.

Despite this assurance, Musk’s latest comments—following more than a decade of delaying tangible progress—have left many questioning the long-standing promises made about Tesla’s self-driving technology.

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